Over the past several years, information technology (IT) has seen a tremendous increase in performance of electronic equipment. As performance has increased, there has been an accompanying increase in the density of electronic components within electronic equipment. Further, increased performance requirements have led to increased energy usage, which has resulted in increased heat dissipation within an already-crowded equipment space. For example, the rate of increase of heat density for communications equipment was 13% annually from 1992 through 1998, at which time it increased to 28%, and is projected to continue to increase. As a result, data centers are demanding better thermally managed products that have good computing performance coupled with good thermal performance. Thus, there is a need to design electronic equipment with better thermal characteristics.